Technology has fast become a cornerstone to deliver superior guest experiences at hotels today. The variety of hotel technology solutions is simply limitless and it simply depends on how far hotel owners are willing to go to enhance the guest experience.
The speed of tech innovation is simply relentless, and while most hotels are still stuck with improving their network designs, hospitality technology updates have made life very competitive in the industry.
Today we discuss four top reasons every hotel should invest in improving their technology infrastructure.
Competitive Advantage
The most obvious reason hotel owners invest in technology improvements is to gain competitive advantage. Investing in hotel technology solutions can deliver some great advantages that include:
- developing new markets through online platforms,
- automating time-consuming processes,
- interconnecting hotel services with mobile,
- enhancing data and asset security,
- simplifying the booking & check-out processes,
- advanced data analytics to forecast future demand,
- highly compliant tech infrastructure,
- enhanced property security & monitoring,
- simpler network design & faster internet services,
- delivering a home-like guest technology experience.
Delightful Guest Technology Experience
Irrespective of which amenities are offered, every hospitality business has one goal, ‘delivering a superior guest experience.’
Most guests today are already tech-savvy and use a mix of technologies at home including smart appliances, voice assistants, mobiles & tablets, online multimedia services, and other lifestyle technologies.
Investing in hotel technology improvements that make everything from check-in to check-out simpler for guests is recommended. Hilton hotels implemented their robot concierge ‘Connie’ back in 2016. Connie extracts information from Watson and WayBlazer A.I.’s developed by IBM.
The smart room is possibly the most crucial factor that influences guest satisfaction. Cutting edge room entertainment, tablet-controlled room environment, gadgets and voice assistants are all brilliant technologies to implement in guest rooms. In June 2018, Amazon rolled out the Alexa for Hospitality A.I. assistant for Marriott hotels. This enhanced version of Alexa can order room service, provide local tourism information, in addition to its usual box of tricks.
A tablet may not sound too exciting, so how about a room controlled with a dedicated tablet? Not only is it a surprise for the guest but one of the most convenient technologies that can be implemented to make the guest technology experience truly memorable.
The Hilton Hotel group has already field tested (2016) and successfully implemented (2017) tablet controlled rooms, with the elegant Hilton Inn Penn being one of their famous pilot sites. Tablet control simply puts the entire hotel in the palm of the guests allowing them to schedule hotel services, make reservations, control multimedia services, and ask for live assistance.
Mobile apps are progressing with leaps & bounds in the hotel industry with over 70% of guests using mobile for reservations in the USA. Like tablet control, mobile technologyHotels with optimized mobile apps experience both growth in revenue and radical improvements in guest ratings, Hotelogix note in their article.
Improve Hotel’s Operational Efficiency
Hotel technology improvements can significantly improve the efficiency of properties thanks to cutting edge advancements in PMS software. Property Management Sytems are signature software designed specifically for hotel operations. While many hotels still run on custom legacy PMS, franchises like the Marriott Group and Wyndham Hotels deploy advanced solutions like the OPERA Oracle PMS.
Leading PMS allows hotels to synchronize data, inform staff about updates, reinforce their cybersecurity systems, speed up service delivery, simplify revenue management, customize room rates for different customer groups and much more.
Hotel technology solutions can allow your staff to deliver services faster, keep track of guest preferences, and be more efficient in planning their daily routine. Similarly, technology solutions can be very crucial for front office and back office management. The ease of synchronizing information across devices allows for better & faster service delivery and hence efficient property management.
Enhanced Security & Risk Compliance
Hospitality technology comes with its own vulnerabilities, however, investing in cutting edge hotel cyber security solutions simply cancels out the threat of hacks, breaches, and cyber threats. It is essential to identify technology gaps in hotel infrastructures, and hence gives birth to maintaining a ‘technology security strategy.’
Usually, hotel owners outsource security & risk management to a specialist ‘hotel technology provider.’ These specialist service providers are equipped with the latest industry knowledge and security tools to manage entire hospitality systems. Hotel technology providers are well versed with the right combination of technologies including the mix of hardware, software, and human resources to get the best out of any hotel.
Security and risk compliance for any hotel begins with the right policies and strategies. Hotels should have:
- Defined cybersecurity & risk assessment policies
- Defined data access authorizations for personnel,
- Security protocols for data storage,
- Hardware compliance,
- POS compliance,
- Systemic risk mitigation,
- Premises security guidelines & controls,
- Network security policies,
- Routine technology GAP analysis.
Conclusion
While the applications of technology in hospitality are limitless, hotel owners should consider a professional audit from credible hotel technology providers. It is essential to invest in hotel technology solutions that are sustainable, and not those that will probably take time to even come in effect. Security remains the most sought out technology solution amongst hotels, primarily because of the number of payment touchpoints found across properties today.
A hotel technology provider usually analyzes hotel infrastructures to determine the effectiveness of solutions before implementing them. Get in touch with our technology consultants today to determine what updates to invest in and get your hotel technology upgraded.
Advanced Hospitality Technologies is a leader in Hospitality Technologies. We have an award winning benchmark for providing affordable, reliable and most advanced hospitality Technology Solutions.
